Dear SM,

Thank You for your opinion.

Mine happens to differ from yours.

The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is.

No matter how much the pre truth denizens might try to bring it down.

Shadow, the Murdoch press has different publications for different sections of its readership 'The Daily Telecrap' is very much for the mass consumption of the misinformed bottom feeders. Those who's first read of the day is the latest news on Blockhead's front up at the Monday night footy tribunal, they want to know if their favorite front rower has been rubbed out, or will he create more mayhem for the Wombats this weekend. That is their first news priority for the day out of the way, then they are ripe for some shock horror "news" from whatever bit of the scare mongering agenda 'Nonews' is peddling at that point in time, Could be 'Gay Muslims secret deal with the Labor Party to take over the Catholic Church' as reported by unnamed reliable sources.
I'm sure you would not disappoint, kicking off a lively forum discussion on the subject, and supply the appropriate shock horror "Telecrap' story to fire up the debate, as you often do.

To challenge what they write, gives their nonsensical diatribes some air of legitimacy, and that is the last thing they deserve. It is mostly contemptible hogwash they publish, in their fish n' chip wrappers, best ignored.

Hi Foxy,

Once more we seem to be in general agreement on a subject. What sets the mainstream media apart from a purely news reporting outfit, something akin to the BBC of the 1950's and 60's is the overuse of opinionated journalism at the expense of news reporting. Although I must say the BBC, and its little Aussie brother the ABC, were with hindsight very much establishment orientated organizations, that used overt censorship when presenting the news. This took the form of a sanitized report, although not overtly biased, one way or the other, they tended to present the established view in a positive manor.
The privately owned electronic media, first radio, and then later on television, seen themselves firstly as entertainment businesses, and news reporting was only of a secondary consequence and received little in the way of finance. Often private electronic media outlets simply relied on reports from the established news organisations like Reuters or the BBC, and local newspaper reports for their daily six o'clock bulletin.
Newspapers have always been different, the mainstream conglomerates owned by the 'Press Barons' presented the (political) news in an extremely biased fashion, coupled with this was totally biased editorial content, all went together to reflect the views, and opinions of the owner. With their control of public opinion this made the Murdoch's of the world such powerful people, answerable to no one, and still are.

Hi Paul,

Maybe. I was raised on the Sydney Morning Herald (when the man delivered it, I used to yell out to my mum, 'Hark ! The Herald !') so every so often, I still buy a copy. But with the best will in the world, I usually get right through it in a quarter of an hour. The Age similar. But I always take at least an hour and a half to get through the Australian. For the big Saturday edition, usually about three hours.

I recall when the SMH had a good coverage of world news, on page 3 if I remember right. Currently the Australian's coverage often goes for three pages, with some quite obscure stories, or stories from rarely-covered countries. And the stories in the Australian are usually accurate as far as I can ell, corroborated eventually by bits and pieces on the ABC or SBS, or from Time or Newsweek.

On the other hand, the Australian doesn't cover Lifestyle stuff as thoroughly as the others. If I wanted to know about the 25 best cheese shops in Melbourne, I suppose I would read The Age. It's a pity life's too short for that. Even a quarter of an hour on The Age seems like a quarter of an hour that I'll never get back.

Joe

There's an interesting article by Terry Barnes
that goes to the crux of the issue. It's worth
a read. Some of the questions raised by Mr Barnes
include - is the line between reporting and
opinion becoming too blurred? Are too many
journalists covering politics becoming "players,"
rather than reporters? Do some media organisations,
have it in for certain political parties? And the
fact that many journalists indeed have become as
much a part of the news as what they report.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-09-02/barnes-does-dutton-have-a-point-about-media-bias/6742332